Contemplations
by Lady Addiction
Summary: Brightly Burning cookie. After the fateful Young Lion's tournament match, Akira has a talk with his father. complete, GEN


**CONTEMPLATIONS**  
A "Brightly Burning" Cookie by Lady Addiction

DISCLAIMER: Hikaru no Go is not mine. This is a fic based off of Aishuu's "Brightly Burning", so BB is not mine either. Whatever tatters are left, however, are mine.

RATING: Gen

PAIRING: None

WARNINGS: Spoilers for chapter 5 of Aishuu's "Brightly Burning", OOCness, rambling, pointless fluffness?

AUTHOR NOTES:

1. This is what you get when I'm on a one-hour bus ride with no pocketbook to keep myself occupied and too much coffee to keep myself asleep. Hope you enjoy.

2. This was written before BB6 was posted and Aishuu had mentioned that there was a similar scene in that chapter. Please note that we wrote the two separately, and this basically diverges from "Brightly Burning" after chapter 5.

3. This was written pretty much after the first cookie but I forgot to post it at FFnet, so it may seem familiar.

WWWW

"Akira."

"Father." Touya Akira nodded at his father, eyes warm with affection, as he settled into

seiza in front of the traditional low Japanese dining table. His father was seated at the short edge across from him, while his mother kneeled in between them. On the smooth, lacquered surface was their usual breakfast: a steaming pot of high-quality ginseng tea, golden omelette rolls studded with bits of ham and bell peppers, succulent grilled tuna fillets, a platter of boiled spinach with sesame-seeds and miso dressing, bowls of miso soup, and fragrant white rice seasoned with bonito flakes. "Mother," he greeted his other parent, who was untying her hot-pink apron from around a dark-green pantsuit.

"Good morning, Akira-san! Congratulations on winning the Young Lion's Tournament yesterday," she replied, her face dimpling as she smiled at her only son.

"Thank you," he returned politely. He could feel the weighted stare of his father from the head of the table as he began to fill his plate. "There were many good players."

"But one truly exceptional," his father inserted calmly, but pointedly.

Touya took a sip of ginseng tea, the heavy, earthy scent pungent and familiar. He had been drinking it ever since he turned ten, his father coming to enjoy it after a Chinese pro introduced it to him. He took the time to swish it around his mouth, letting it warm his insides, while he considered what he wanted to say. Swallowing, he took a deep breath. "Amano-san has already printed out the kifu for the tournament?"

"The tournament kifu will show in next week's edition as you well know, Akira. However, a few people have already mentioned your game to me, and Amano-san himself invited me to view a copy of the kifu," his father answered methodically.

"I see." Akira looked down at his plate, using his chopsticks to push an omelette roll around. Being the Meijin and one of the most renowned Go professional in Japan, his father had a network to be envied. Akira, however, hadn't expected to be confronted about the game with Shindou so soon; the tournament had just finished yesterday, after all.

"The Institute was already in an uproar by early evening last night," his father continued, taking the time to slowly consume his own breakfast. "Ashiwara-kun came by the salon while I was there with Ogata-kun, Kuwabara-sensei, and Odera-san. He showed us both his game with Shindou Hikaru and yours. Afterwards, while I was conversing with Kuroda-Kakusei, one of his students who had stayed to watch told us all about your game. Then I saw Amano-san and he showed me the kifu."

Touya kept quiet at this monologue, chewing one piece of tuna for a little too long.

"Amano-san also told me one interesting piece of information, which I verified after studying the kifu."

He knew what was coming. "You think Shindou Hikaru is Sai, Father?" He himself had just spent half the night replaying that game on the board. During the match he had been too caught up in trying to read the pattern, to stay ahead, to notice. Later, the truth was quite apparent.

"No, not Sai."

"But Sai's pupil," finished Akira. He met his father's steady gaze. "There is almost no doubt about it. Shindou is Sai's pupil."

"Amano-san had said that Shinoda-kun, the insei supervisor, said the same thing. Both the games Ashiwara-kun showed me did show many moves heavily influenced by Sai's old but unconventional style. The depth of understanding…he is not a copycat, nor someone who studied and memorized kifu only," Touya-Meijin concurred. He looked thoughtful and intense. Akira felt a pang in his chest. He knew his father was still bothered by his loss to the undefeated NetGo player. While Sai, after three years, was now renowned in the international Go circuit as one of the greatest, if not the greatest Go player as he was still undefeated, he was a phantom. Akira had personally known a few of the higher-dan players who had challenged the NetGo champion and lost, only to declaim later that Sai was a fraud, a cheat, a coward. After all, such people reasoned, if he was truly that great, he would reveal himself and formally join the professional circuit. While Touya-Meijin would not stoop to such tactics, Akira did know that his father had always regarded Sai with mild disgust for hiding himself away. To lose to someone he barely acknowledged…

Akira sympathized with his father, but did not regard Sai in the same way. He followed Sai intensely, studying and learning from each of the net-kifus. Currently, there were Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and English databases solely reserved for Sai's kifu. There had even been rumours that the Institute would give Sai a special dispensation to an automatic pro status regardless of his age and ethnicity, once he announced his identity. And it wasn't only Tokyo's Institute that would give such dispensation. Ogata-san, a good friend of both Akira and his father, followed Sai's online career with a fanaticism that more than overshadowed Akira's own, and had it from reliable sources that almost all of the Go Institutes around the globe were frantic to identify and recruit the master player.

"Yes…but, Father…" Akira looked down, then back up again. "Don't you find it strange that Sai hasn't been seen online for over three months now? For the past three years, Sai would play five to ten games daily, sometimes even more! But now, no one has heard from him." Not since he defeated you.

"And the insei exams began at around that time."

"Yes! Shindou couldn't have been an insei before then – he's too strong! Maybe…maybe…" he really was Sai. Akira had pored over that endlessly before falling in an unsettled sleep. He had theorized that maybe he just hadn't been able to bring out Sai's genius, but the game denied that. That match with Shindou…had been the hardest and farthest he had pushed himself or pulled an opponent forward during a match ever since he had turned twelve and discovered that the only challenges left to him were from people three to four times his age. He had seen Sai battle with much less skilled foes. No, Shindou wasn't Sai. But…

"Akira."

He started, drawn abruptly from his circular reverie. His father was looking at him again, but there was a small upturn on that stern mouth. "Father?"

"That game was well worthy of an old title-holder like me, regardless of who your opponent is." There was a warm regard evident in his father's gaze that made Akira flush with pride. "I congratulate you on finding a new and most challenging rival."

The young man's his countenance brightened, his light-green eyes sparkling. "You're wrong, Father. I didn't find him, and he didn't find me. We were most probably led to each other."

The two men exchanged small grins, and returned to their breakfast. The sole female in the room took a deep breath and sighed, her eyes crinkling with wry resignation as she finally allowed herself to enjoy the fruits of her work with her family.

-FIN-

Review please?


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